A congressman on Friday urged the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas to name the banks that have already submitted applications to increase their Automated Teller Machine user charges, following the lifting of a six-year freeze.
Makati City Rep. Luis Campos Jr. said the banks are bound to be identified anyway, considering that both the House and the Senate are poised to launch separate inquiries.
The BSP has a Financial Consumer Protection Department that could release the names of the applicant banks, Campos said.
Campos was responding to a BSP official’s previous disclosure that “less than 10 banks” have already petitioned that they be allowed to raise their ATM transaction fees.
The BSP official also said that “at least one big bank” is actually seeking to slash its ATM user fee.
“That’s good news. If one big bank can bring down its ATM charge, presumably due to economies of scale, why can’t the rest of the big banks do the same?” Campos asked.
Economies of scale with respect to ATM operations simply means that the bigger banks with more machines achieve greater cost-savings from the higher level of use.
“While it might be understandable for the smaller banks with fewer ATMs to want to raise their fees, it might be harder for the bigger banks to justify their plans to jack up charges,” Campos said.
Banks currently charge between P10 to P15 per single interbank withdrawal transaction, and P2 to P2.50 per single interbank balance inquiry.
A number of banks had wanted to push up their ATM charges by as much as 50 percent before the BSP ordered a standstill in 2013.
Another member of Congress, Surigao del Sur Rep. Johnny Pimentel, earlier said that the BSP ought to explain why it suddenly decided to lift the moratorium.
The Department of Trade and Industry led by Secretary Ramon Lopez said on Wednesday that it will fight the looming increases in ATM fees.
The five largest full-service universal private banks in terms of market capitalization at the Philippine Stock Exchange are: BDO Unibank Inc. (BDO), Bank of the Philippine Islands (BPI), Metropolitan Bank & Trust Co. (Metrobank), Security Bank Corp. and Philippine National Bank (PNB).
BDO has “over 4,000 ATMs,” without counting the 976 ATMs of sister lender China Banking Corp.
BPI has “over 2,100 ATMs,” while Metrobank has “over 2,300 ATMs,” without counting the 575 ATMs of subsidiary Philippine Savings Bank (PSBank).
Security Bank has 760 ATMs, while PNB has 1,395. Meanwhile, the state-owned LandBank of the Philippines (LBP) has 2,099 ATMs.